Auto racing notebook: Hamlin has easy drive to Nationwide victory

Denny Hamlin grabbed the lead for the first time 44 laps into the NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Richmond International Raceway last night and dominated the rest of the 250-lap race.

Denny Hamlin grabbed the lead for the first time 44 laps into the NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Richmond International Raceway last night and dominated the rest of the 250-lap race.

He lost the lead briefly when he pitted under a green flag, again when Aric Almirola got underneath him after the first restart and then grabbed it back six laps later for good.

The victory is the 11th of Hamlin's career in the Nationwide Series and came one night after he passed Kyle Busch on the last lap to win his charity race at the track.

Unlike that race, in which Hamlin needed all 75 laps to rally from starting at the back of the field, he was 11th on the starting grid and enjoyed huge leads most of the night.

He led 199 of the 251 laps and made it look easy each time he had the chance.

When Kelly Bires spun into the turn 4 wall for the first caution on lap 124, Hamlin was leading by eight seconds. And when he opened a lead of nearly six seconds over Ricky Stenhouse Jr. with 30 laps to go, Hamlin was able to try to save fuel to make it to the checkered flag.

Stenhouse, however, brought out the second caution when he ran out of gas himself on lap 243, and when Almirola also ran out of gas behind him, Hamlin opted to pit to be safe.

On the restart on lap 250, he had Paul Menard behind him, followed by points leader Justin Allgaier. Hamlin easily outran Menard on the first lap under green and was already cruising when a crash in the fourth turn brought out another caution, clinching Hamlin's victory.

Menard was second, followed by Allgaier, Elliott Sadler and Brad Keselowski.

Montoya wins Sprint Cup pole at Richmond

Juan Pablo Montoya and his team needed some time to get up to full speed. When they did, they ended up winning the pole for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race tonight at Richmond.

"It's exciting. We unloaded this morning and it was a bit of a headache getting the car to run at the beginning. It was dragging a lot and when we finally got it rolling, we felt like we had a pretty decent race car," Montoya said after turning a fast lap at 128.639 mph.

Montoya earned his second No. 1 starting spot of the season, his seventh overall and the first of his career on a track shorter than a mile. He looks forward to trying to back the effort up under the lights at D-shaped, 0.75-mile track.

"If the cars runs somewhere near what it did in practice, we might have a chance," he said.

Regan Smith qualified second, the best starting spot of his career, at 128.352 mph.

"We've been qualifying really well this year and I wish I knew why because the past two or three years, I haven't qualified to save my life," he said.

The good fortune hasn't continued in races, where he's finished in the top 10 just once through eight races.

Force tops funny car qualifying in Texas

John Force raced to the No. 1 qualifying position in funny car in the NHRA Spring Nationals at Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown, Texas.

Force powered his Ford Mustang to a 4.097-second run at 310.27 mph. If his performance holds after the final two qualifying sessions today, Force will earn his 137th career No. 1 spot. Pro stock great Warren Johnson has the NHRA qualifying record of 138.